Sleep, oil on canvas, 85x 65 cm

Kaikaoss‘ realistically painted pictures seem completely natural at first sight. They don’t seem to give the viewer any problems – one recognizes instruments, toys, women and men, houses; in the new pictures it is especially sheet music tacked to a wall, lying on a body, floating to the ground. So everything seems very simple and self-evident. Actually, however, there is always something like a „second ground“ in his pictures.

For example, in the upper quarter of the picture, one sees a naked woman lying, behind her are a variety of houses. Above that there is a blue sky with clouds. Below her, partly covering her, there are many. Many pages of sheet music. The sheets of music are partly kinked, they seem to be falling down. The bafflement now is that „behind“ that, there is a wall. It seems to be painstakingly papered – except for a tear through which you can see the wall. On their own, the picture’s details make sense, but when you see them together, it can’t be that way „in reality“. Which relation do the parts of the picture have with each other? Where is the woman? Is she a „real“ woman – or is it a „picture“ of the woman? If it is a „picture within a picture“, then where is the margin? What does the sheet music have to do with it, the houses, the sky?

All these questions can be asked with his pictures. Everything that seems plausible and „right“ at first sight is questioned upon closer inspection. This way the artist plays with our perceptive expectations in an ingenious manner. Stylistically, he can be classified between the veristic surrealism of, say, René Magritte and the newest tendencies of a „realistic“ style of painting.